2nd Blood Moon Lunar Eclipse of the year! Did you see it!?

Did you see the Bloody Bloody Blood Moon this morning? If you were up early, and looked up right before the sun came out, you would have seen it – the moon suspended in the night’s blackness, shining a red coppery color. It was at full eclipse at 6:25am!

This was the final lunar eclipse of 2014! If you missed it, be sure to mark you calendar for the next blood moon – April 4, 2015!

Why is the Blood Moon red?
The lunar eclipse occurred because the moon was covered with the Earth’s shadow…and it looked red because of what’s called “Rayleigh scattering” of sunlight the same light scattering that causes the sky to redden during a sunset. Basically, to break it down simpler, what happens is as follows: during the eclipse, the moon sits in the Earth’s shadow (also known as the umbra); observers on earth who look up at the moon during the eclipse will therefore see the color the Earth’s shadow (umbra) casts on it. What’s interesting is that, despite what logic might tell you, the Earth’s shadow (umbra) is not completely black! The shadow actually is actually red,orange, and yellow due to the Earth’s atmosphere scattering out shorter wavelength light, and leaving the longer wavelengths.

Where is the best viewing?

For this particualr lunar eclipse, the best place to see this blood moon was in New Zealand, Western North America, Eastern Asia, Eastern Australia, Japan, and Hawaii.

When are the next Blood Moons?
If you missed this blood moon, there are 2 more coming up soon to complete the “Tetrad” of four blood moons that have started… the dates of the blood moons are as follows: